


On His Way

by Claudia_bm



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, M/M, Minor Violence, Multi, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 15:54:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5503733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claudia_bm/pseuds/Claudia_bm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was trained to be a killer. For the longest time, he didn't know how to be anything else. They showed him he could be so much more</p>
            </blockquote>





	On His Way

**Author's Note:**

> No particular setting. Though it was probably after the movie and Rey was training with Luke to become a Jedi. Playing with lore because I'm annoying like that

Love came to Finn but it didn’t give him even the smallest clue of what to do with it. He wasn’t surprised to find himself fumbling between them, wondering what he should do or how he should react. It wasn't like there had been a ‘how to show and receive affection 101’ class at what Poe had jokingly called Stormtroopers Academy, capital first letters and all. More like a ‘how to disembowl a man in various different ways’ 101 class. Love? No way.

So it must be why he felt like he was going to class now, but it wasn’t just a love 101 class. It was a Trust 101 class, a Believe 101 class, because those were different thing, an Accepting 101 class, a You Are An Individual But You Are Not Alone 101 class. And really, it was so important that he had such good teachers because, reasons. As if out of reflex, sometimes Finn looked at Poe, bending at the waist to pat BB-8’s.. er… head (Poe really didn't know if that could be classified as a head), his back exposed, and thought about the ways he could get at Poe’s kidneys and the damage he could do with just about any pointy thing. He looked at Rey, sitting up on her bedroll stretching, her shirt hicked up to reveal smooth skin, and remembered the spot between the 3th and 4th rib that he could drive a knife into. 

When that happened, he felt disgusted with himself and hid away. Sometimes for a few hours, sometimes for a whole day. They didn’t deserve this, he told himself, not a brainwashed killing machine lying between them at night when they were the most vulnerable. Not a murderer who looked at them like two pieces of meat and calculated the best places to cut them open. After times like these, he couldn’t even bring himself to touch them. Afraid his touch would hurt them, would turn poisonous. He curled into himself and remembered how Poe had kissed him, slowly and softly, while Rey whispered in his ears how to move his lips just right to kiss back. He remembered Rey’s fingers stroking his face and Poe kissing her wrist after a particular vigorous spar, the three of them lying on the dirt. He remembered Poe and he each kissed a rosy cheek when Rey left for training every morning and when she returned every afternoon. Trust 101. You Are Not Alone 101. Tell us when something’s wrong.

So he did.

They surprised him, but that was nothing new. They always would, for there were many things he didn’t know, many things he needed to learn still. But he was, learning.

They did this.

Rey knocked him onto his ass, again, a reminiscent of when they first met. She stood over him, a proud warrior-to-be, pointing her staff at his chest. She had parted with most of the things she carried from Jakku, discarding the old rags and shedding with them the chains that held her back, but the staff she kept. She didn’t say why so Finn felt it would be inappropriate to ask. She cocked her head. “You know, I am capable of breaking your sternum and probably your collarbone as well like this.” Her voice was normal, as if they were chatting about the weather. Boney with a chance of bruise. “Do you think I get hung up on it?”

But it’s different, Finn found himself saying. We’re different. You don’t understand. You learn this to protect. It was taught to me to kill, to murder people for the First Order. Your people. Only now they were his people too, but that went without saying. He was breathing hard when he finished, even though he hadn’t been shouting. Rey crouched down, then she flopped down to sit none to gently on his stomach, her legs on either side of him. She looked into his eyes and he was scared that she wouldn't find in them whatever it was she was looking for. Her expression revealed nothing, however, when she asked.

“Do you want to kill me then?”

“What? No! Never!” He would die first. And that was the simple truth. She leaned back a little, mirth gleaming in her own eyes. “Do you trust me, Finn?”

“Yes.” He answered, didn’t even have to think about it. Rey smiled. “So you’ll have to trust when I say that I trust you, that you don’t want to kill me, right?”

The implication was lost on him for several minutes, but when he got it, he wanted to cry and to splutter at the same time. He settled on sending her an incredulous look. “But how can you be sure?”

She threw her head back and laughed, then laughed some more at his bafflement. She leant down to kiss the top of his nose and whispered in a mock-serious tone that clearly meant to sound mysterious: “Because, young master Finn, I am a Jedi.”

Then she leapt off him, bounced away, totally ignored his shouting that she was still in training.

Poe took his hand, didn’t say anything for a while. He knew what had gone through Finn’s head, and he knew what Rey had said. Finn liked holding hands. It was nice, reassuring. It told him that they were here, and there was no blade, no whip, no punishment in their hands, only love. It told him that the next thing that came for him would not be pain. So he liked holding hands, even more than kissing sometimes. Poe held his hand, and seemingly lost for words. Poe. No one had made him speechless before, at least not to Finn’s knowledge. But Poe’s eyes were earnest, and without a hint of judgment, just endless patience and understanding. “We can handle ourselves, love.” He said. And the thing that came next made Finn realise that he wasn’t perhaps the only one wrestling with this guilt after all. 

“We’re all killers, Finn.” And Poe smiled sadly. "But sometimes you have to believe that it doesn't make us bad people."

So, did his lovers manage to solve his problems, undo what had been drilled into him, wash away his fear, clear the doubt in his heart?

Of course not.

And Finn suspected that they would not be able to in a while yet. His guilt was much too great, and he had much to learn still. But, Finn had decided, that was alright.

Poe turned in his sleep, startled Finn out of his thought. The pilot mumbled something as he nuzzled into the crook of Finn’s neck and threw his arm around Finn’s middle. The movement jointed Rey, who was lying on Finn’s other side, and she, too, turned around to buried her face into Finn’s fourth and fifth rib. It was lucky that Finn wasn’t ticklish. Right, he was learning still, day by day, how to love, how to touch the soft place on their bodies without thinking of death, how to trust them to guide him where he needed to be. More than that, he was learning to be their support too, to be there when Rey was lonely, or when Poe needed someone with him. He was learning to be what he needed to be, and what they needed him to be. Nothing he had ever encountered felt better than this. 

Finn was getting there. He would be there someday, that he was sure of. He tightened the hold around his lovers and finally drifted off to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'ed. if you could point out any mistake I would be forever grateful


End file.
